Healthy eating helps improve student performance, experts say

Nov. 18, 2013

Students prepare ingredients during a culinary arts class at Preble High School in Green Bay on Nov. 6. / Lukas Keapproth/Press-Gazette Media

Students chop fresh jalepenos and bell peppers in preparation for the next day's breakfast during a culinary arts class at Preble High School in Green Bay. / Lukas Keapproth/Press-Gazette Media

Live54218 Outlook

The local health advocacy group aims to curb obesity in Brown County. A look at where the group stands: • In Brown County, 27.5 percent of residents are obese, and 67 percent of adults are overweight or obese, compared with 64 percent of Wisconsin adults. • The future health, academic achievement, economic success, and quality of life in Brown County are at stake if overweight and obesity rates continue to rise. We must address the health risk behaviors and negative environments that lead to unhealthy weight and high burden of chronic disease. • We can transform the places we live, learn, work and play into environments that support health and decrease the rate of overweight and obesity. — Live54218

Shelby Snell places noodles into boiling water for a macaroni dish during a culinary arts class at Preble High School in Green Bay. / Lukas Keapproth/Press-Gazette Media

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Healthy eating cannot replace cracking a book, but local health experts say diet and physical fitness can go a long way to helping students do well on tough standardized tests.

Studies indicate improved brain function and academic success follows healthy lifestyles, said Jennifer Van Den Elzen, director of advocacy group Live 54218. Students throughout Wisconsin have completed the Wisconsin Knowledge and Concepts exam in recent days.

Van Den Elzen said efforts such as farm-to-school programs encourage students to eat more fresh fruits and produce, which can improve their health and help curb obesity. Live54218, a local nonprofit which aims to promote healthier lifestyles in Brown County, is coordinating Green Bay area farm-to-school efforts.

“There’s been a ton of studies done at national level that show kids that are properly nourished and properly fit will do better on a standardized tests,” Van Den Elzen said.

Action for Healthy Kids, a national nonprofit and volunteer network aiming to fight childhood obesity notes studies in the past decade have found that fourth-graders with the lowest amount of protein in their diets had the lowest achievement scores and that iron deficiency anemia can cause shorter attention spans, irritability, fatigue and difficulty with concentration.

Children who suffer from poor nutrition during the brain's most formative years scores have much lower on tests of vocabulary, reading comprehension, math and overall knowledge, according to the group.

About 23 percent of Wisconsin high school students were overweight or obese in 2009, according to state reports, and nearly 14 percent of children ages 2 to 4 participating in the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) are obese and 16.7 percent of them are overweight.

School districts in Northeastern Wisconsin are just kicking off farm-to-school efforts, but as they move forward Van Den Elzen said studies will be done to help determine ways healthy eating and fitness helps students do better academically.

Americorps farm-to-school programs in the state were evaluated in 2011 and Green Bay area programs would be part of the next round of studies, Van Den Elzen said.

Eight local school districts — Green Bay, Ashwaubenon, Oneida, De Pere, Pulaski, West De Pere, Howard-Suamico and Wrightstown — have signed on to farm-to-school programs in the past two years. They are working with Live54218, an advocacy organization that aims to promote healthy lifestyles in Brown County.

The farm-to-school effort works to encourage schools to buy fresh produce from local farmers as much as possible, as well as educating students about the fresh foods on the food line in the cafeteria. Some local studies already are underway, Van Den Elzen said.

Live54218 is working with state researchers look at third- and fifth-graders in Oneida schools to help determine whether money invested in farm-to-school programs are having an impact.

The idea is to determine how much knowledge students are gaining about healthier foods and their attitudes about eating them.

“A fruits and vegetable survey looks at, ‘Are kids comfortable with it? Do they have knowledge of it? Do they like it?’” Van Den Elzen said. “We want to find out if farm to school is having an impact. We want more kids to be at a healthy weight.

“We’re looking at things like, ‘are they trying the apple? Are they even willing to try the apple?’”

Van Den Elzen acknowledged changing the tides will take time.

“We know they’re not going to eat the apple and lose five pounds,” she siad. “We want to make sure we have the infrastructure in place so we can look at those long-term changes. This gives us a base to start with.”

She said the last piece will be to measure how changes in diet, exercise and weight affect test scores.

Although the topic is covered in much national research, she said local evaluation is important to add context.

“If you think about the picture of a starving child in Africa, we wouldn’t expect them to do well in school, to be alert,” Van Den Elzen said. “We don’t really see that in U.S., but here kids are malnourished and hungry, but in an obese body. We need to chip away at the problem. That’s the value of farm to school.”

Local researchers will evaluate Wisconsin Knowledge and Concepts Examinations scores by school, not individual student.

“The idea is to see if it is having a positive or negative impact over time,” Va Den Elzen said. “We think evaluation is extremely important. We know nationally that it works, let’s see locally.”

Public schools exist to help students learn and become successful members of society, she noted.

“What we know is that if kids aren’t well nourished or are under-exercised, they are not coming ready to learn,” Van Den Elzen said. “When they eat well, they are there and present and able to learn.”